In my first blog post, I talked about how I don't like to write and how I discovered this when I took a creative writing class my freshman year in college. As is usually the case, the story is actually a little bit more complicated.I very much enjoyed writing some of my college papers. In my junior year, for example, I took a class on the psychology of the unconscious. I didn't particularly like the class but I loved writing the final paper. I was interested in how contemporary psychological theories understood an old religious question: Do we come to feel good about ourselves by doing good works or do we need more direct ways of transforming painful feelings like guilt and shame?Because I chose a topic that was of great personal interest to me, I got very involved in writing my paper. I read a lot of books and wrote until I felt I had answered the question to my satisfaction. As a result, the paper was much longer than the assignment required. When I turned it in, the professor complained about the length and accused me of turning in a paper I had written for another class.Why am I telling this story here? Often, when people are trying to find their life path, they're encouraged to think about what is sometimes called their "skill set". The idea seems to be that if you make a list of your skills-e.g. good at communication, good with computers-you can then use this list to figure out what you want to do with your life. If you're good at communication and computers, you might want to be in sales or management. If you're good with kids, you might want to be a teacher, and so on. The idea seems to be that, if you can capture your skill set in a resume, you'll be on the path to finding your life direction.I don't think the story about writing my college paper is unusual. I think many people have had experiences like this in their lives. But they often don't understand how to use these experiences to help them find their life path. So, let me begin that process by introducing the second Lost Highway Blues Rule of the Road:
DON'T WRITE A RESUME (to figure out what you want to do with your life).
Writing my paper was a great experience. But it wasn't a great experience because it allowed me to use my writing "skill set" (a skill set I didn't even think I had.) It was a great experience because writing it really mattered to me. It mattered so much that1) I was willing to put in a lot more work than was actually required for the course;2) I was willing to give up other things that were important to me-time with my friends, going out, free time-in order to spend time on my paper;3) I was motivated primarily by internal satisfactions (wanting to answer my question), not external ones (like wanting to get a good grade);4) I was willing to take risks, such as getting a negative reaction from my professor;5) I chose to do something-writing-that I would not have chosen to do in another context (such as writing a research paper, which I managed to avoid throughout college).If you're struggling to find your life path, don't write a resume. Instead, think about things you've done in your life, in both work and play, that had one or more of the qualities I've just listed.
FINDING YOUR LIFE PATH MEANS FINDING WHAT MATTERS TO YOU.
If you’re willing to do one or more of these five things, you’ve found something that matters.
If you start thinking along these lines and come to the conclusion that you haven't had any experiences that mattered to you in this way or that they've been too few and far between to be useful to you in finding your life path, psychotherapy may be able to help you. People sometimes hold themselves back from having experiences that could matter to them because they feel these experiences could be dangerous. For example, they may feel afraid to take a risk because they're afraid of being shamed or humiliated. Or they may not be able to make time for a meaningful activity because they are afraid to say no to a friend or partner who wants their time.I'll have more to say about these issues in future blogs. In the mean time, I welcome your comments and questions. I review all comments before posting them and will not post anything that I think will make this an unsafe place to post your thoughts. Until next time...Jane